Ali Sharifi leading Grant Thornton UK corporate finance practice

15 May 2014

Grant Thornton UK LLP is pleased to announce the appointment of Ali Sharifi as the national head of its corporate finance practice.

Based in Manchester, Ali has been with the firm since 1999. He leads the team across seven dedicated corporate finance centres in England - London, Reading, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Cambridge and Bristol - and a team in Scotland.

Commenting on the appointment, Mark Byers, UK Head of Advisory, Grant Thornton UK LLP said: “We are delighted that Ali has agreed to take this role on. I'm confident that he will provide the strong leadership required to deliver Grant Thornton’s corporate finance strategy across the UK and fulfil our firm wide ambition to be trusted advisors to our clients; providing the best in class advice and execution excellence to help them grow.”

Sharifi said: “The team is already hugely successful, and to build on this, we shall continue to leverage Grant Thornton’s international network and strong relationships. Over 50% of our deals are conducted cross-border and we enjoy a strong market position in all the major economies, including the United States, China, India, Japan, Germany, and France.”

Ali became a partner at Grant Thornton in 2005 and will retain a day-to-day involvement in deals around the UK, and the North of England in particular.

Earlier this year Grant Thornton was confirmed by Experian Corpfin as the number one financial adviser to UK companies by deal volume for the third year running. Grant Thornton advised on 131 deals in 2013 and outperformed the market – recording an 8% increase on 2012 compared to the 2.9% uptick in total volume of industry deals last year.

Business support services and industrials were the busiest sectors for the firm with 36 and 35 deals completed respectively. Closely followed by the financial services and technology sectors with 24 deals each.